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Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

theguardian.com

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Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#161

Post by md_ »

Mirioron wrote: post #139
md_ wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To paraphrase @popehat, this is just how federal prisons are. (OK, I don't know how such prisons are in the UK, but presumably they're bad.) That's a Bad Thing, for sure. But I suspect most of Assange's fans aren't upset about the treatment of Assange because they oppose the carceral state; it's because they're fans of Assange. In other words, if you say "I'm opposed to the conditions of Assange's detention", I suspe…

Prisons shouldn't be allowed to be that way to begin with.

Agreed! I wish more people would focus on that, instead of being focused on one particular prison resident (and far from the most sympathetic, in my view).

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#162

Post by galangalalgol »

Pet_Ant wrote: post #126
koheripbal wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that this thread is driven by the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, I think it's important to remember that the invasion of Afghanistan was a NATO operation after NATO invoked Article 5 (Collective Defence) in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks that Al-Quaeda launched, organized by their leadership based in Afghanistan under the protection of the Taliban. There are a few additional facts folks forget since this i…

> IMO, "nation building" is always an impossible mission. The objective should have been to attack, destroy the enemy, and leave - immediately. They should never do anything that makes the lives of ordinary Afghans worse who suffered more from the Taliban than the US. You can’t just bomb a country, create a power vacuum, and nope out of there. Moral cowardice in the extreme. As a counter example see Japan and Iraq.

This whole post is about holding leaders accountable. The same should be true for those leaders in Afghanistan who aided the attacks on 9/11. But staying to prop up a government in a nation that had already suffered a proxy war occupation by Russia, and had sent them packing (with our help) was always a doomed effort. The culture there won't permit such a thing. So I think leaving a power vacuum would have been the lesser evil, vs prolonging it, or leaving the guilty unaccountable, as we did in SA.

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#163

Post by trasz »

blunte wrote: post #2

Key figures in US military and US leadership need to be held accountable. Same as with CEOs, if you only punish the organization and not specifically the leaders, there is no disincentive to doing it again. Clearly the US is exempt from the war crimes laws, and that needs to change. But it would require leaders of other major powers/countries to push for this. But… this will never happen because almost no leader want…

Not necessarily - look at how early Mossad prosecuted the guilty sheltering in countries that were not willing to cooperate. Sure, they had to break some eggs - letter bombs are not necessarily precise - but the collateral damage was minimal and the whole scheme worried just fine.

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#164

Post by trasz »

the-dude wrote: post #40
trasz wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its opponents. I can easily imagine eg Russia openly claiming that since the international law doesn’t apply to US combatants, they are to be assumed to be terrorists and not soldiers.

And then what? Set off WW3?

Then continue with proxy wars, which take place anyway.

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#165

Post by Beldin »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #144
blunte wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps the first line of defense against such an invasion would be to agitate the farmers, causing them to drive all their tractors back into town. It's pretty difficult to get anything done with them ruining all transportation.

> It's pretty difficult to get anything done with them ruining all transportation. If the US turn destroyed all the dikes, then it could use amphibious assault ships for troop transport.

Destroying dikes is part of the Dutch defense plan, actually.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nieuwe_Hollandse_Waterlinie

Of course, officially, "this plan is abandoned" nowadays. Nevertheless, I'd bring boots if I were invading...

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#166

Post by chmod775 »

Manuel_D wrote: post #146
bildung wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The concept of an international criminal court itself is an affront to national sovereignty, and isn’t very widely supported. It is supported (i.e. signed and ratified) by all industrialized countries except the US. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/States_parties_to_the_Rome_Sta...

It looks like it's not ratified by plenty of industrialized countries: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ICC_member_states.svg

Let's count them: Monaco, Israel, Singapore, United States of America, also Hong Kong, Macau, Vatican City if you want to count those. Everyone else in red or orange on that map is not considered an industrialized/developed country.

4-7 is plenty now? Especially considering the size and situation of the others?

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#167

Post by chopin »

woodpanel wrote: post #152
chopin wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That does not exonerate him. He could have stepped back and make the pressure public. Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger did step back when she did not agree with a legislative proposal.

Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger was less important and probably less threatened. Otto Schily instead, then interior minister of Germany, alledgedly was fearing for the security of his loved ones, caused by threats made against him.

> Otto Schily instead, then interior minister of Germany, alledgedly was fearing for the security of his loved ones, caused by threats made against him.

I never heard of this. Do you have any sources for this?

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#169

Post by foobarian »

mschuster91 wrote: post #158
koheripbal wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given that this thread is driven by the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, I think it's important to remember that the invasion of Afghanistan was a NATO operation after NATO invoked Article 5 (Collective Defence) in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks that Al-Quaeda launched, organized by their leadership based in Afghanistan under the protection of the Taliban. There are a few additional facts folks forget since this i…

> IMO, "nation building" is always an impossible mission. The objective should have been to attack, destroy the enemy, and leave - immediately. Punishing the sponsors of the 9/11 attacks, not entrenching an ideological split. That's bollocks. I'm German, had the Allied Powers followed the Morgenthau plan Germany would be essentially an Afghanistan today - an agro state and nothing more. But you all followed through w…

> But you all followed through with Marshall, and that was perhaps the ideal example that nation building works.

I don't know about this. I may call it "nation re-building" - Europe already had highly developed societies, infrastructure, and institutions. But coming into a less developed country and trying to insert those institutions by force - or even worse replace them - sounds unlikely to work.

I wonder if maybe the Americans started actually believing the nation building stuff after saying it over and over for 5 decades...

Re: Guantánamo survivor on the war on terror’s failure

#170

Post by the-dude »

blunte wrote: post #119
the-dude wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since you are bringing up NATO, I will just spell out the Hague Invasion Act ELI5 : US Congress signed into law the a priori consent of invading the capitol of one of its NATO allies ( NL ). Disclaimer : I am Dutch.

Perhaps the first line of defense against such an invasion would be to agitate the farmers, causing them to drive all their tractors back into town. It's pretty difficult to get anything done with them ruining all transportation.

They will come in with helicopters, raid the ICC and fly out again.
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